Tuniewicz Nominates Redpath for At-Large. Malagon Wins

Last updated on September 12, 2023

The final outcome. Malagon wins 11-5.

Voting for Adrian Malagon: Benner,  Blankenship, Dassing, Ford, Haman, Harlos, Malagon, McArdle, Rufo, Watkins, Yeniscavich (11)

Voting for Bill Redpath: Hagopian, Nanna, Nekhaila, Pantke, Tuniewicz (5)

Mark Tuniewicz nominated Bill Redpath to fill the vacant LNC At-Large position

Selected messages from the LNC discussion of candidates for the LNC At-Large position.

Mark Tuniewicz

I’ll nominate Mr. Bill Redpath to become our next At-Large Member.

For those not familiar with Mr. Redpath’s service to the Libertarian Party, a brief summary is below. After reading it, I think you’ll agree he is by far our most qualified candidate.

If we are truly interested in meritocracy, we ought name Mr. Redpath to the At-large seat, then to the Executive Committee.

With best wishes,

Mark Tuniewicz

Bill Redpath has been a Libertarian Party member since April 30, 1984. He currently serves as State Chair for the Libertarian Party of IL, and is the Region 6 Alternate to the LNC.

He has served over 21 years on the LNC, from September 1989 to September 1993 and from March 2003 to July 2020. He was Chair of the LNC from 2006 to 2010 and was Treasurer three separate
occasions. He has also served as an At-Large Representative.

Bill was an eight time candidate for public office, including:
Virginia House of Delegates, 34th District, 1993
Virginia Senate, 33rd District, 1998
Governor of Virginia, 2001
US Senate, Virginia, 2008
US House, Virginia, 10th District, 2010 & 2014
US House, Illinois, 6th District, 2020
US Senate, Illinois, 2022.

Redpath is best known for his work on ballot access in the LP. He is the current National Ballot Access Coordinator for the Libertarian Party. He began doing volunteer petitioning in Virginia in 1988 and became involved in national ballot access in 1990 when he was on the LNC. The LP presidential ticket made the ballot in all 50 states and DC in 1992 and 1996, which was the first time that a minor party presidential ticket made the ballot across the nation in successive presidential elections.

Since 1990 and in great measure due to his commitment, the LP has placed a presidential ticket on the ballot in all 50 states and DC in five of eight presidential elections.

Redpath gathered 7,181 volunteer signatures and spent over $45,000 of his own money over a three month period in 2022 to help place the 2022 LPIL statewide candidate slate on the ballot in Illinois.

Recently retired, Redpath has an active Certified Public Accountant license in Illinois and is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA). He is an Accredited Senior Appraiser in Business Valuation in the American Society of Appraisers and holds the Accredited in Business Valuation designation from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

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Mark Tuniewicz
I vote for Mr. Redpath, and encourage others to do so as well. By way of explanation…

During this challenging time for the Committee, we need his experience as a full member. If we pride ourselves on hiring by merit, then he is the only legitimate choice.

I’d ask my fellow committee members to bear some other things in mind as they cast their vote. We recently went through a difficult situation where a nepotistic hire was made by the Chair (not debating that decision…it’s over and done with), with no opportunity for public LNC discussion, and having to, after getting legal advice, have the LNC approve the decision post-hire. The whole situation was….well, the perception of nepotism in the LNC is now there, for better or for worse.

Now, we seek to replace one of our own members. Will we do so because someone shares a caucus or PAC affiliation, or will we make this decision on the basis of experience and merit? Will we elect someone who’s been a party member only since 2021 (3 years), or someone with the breadth of a lifetime of LP experience, leadership success (and humility, I might add?) to really make a difference?

I’m raising these points because, after the nepotism situation, if we as a board don’t make what to me is the obvious choice here, it will perpetuate this growing perception that this board is beholden to outside interests and PACs, and further erode our legitimacy, ability to fundraise, public perception and more. We need to begin making decisions that are in the best interests of the Party, not a PAC.

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[Editor: It has been brought to our attention that while the following two messages were found in the LNC discussion thread on electing a new At-Large member, they should be understood as referring to the separate motion to elect Mr. Malagon to the Executive Committee. However, Mr. Tuniewicz is highly perspicacious, and his remarks turn out to be equally applicable to the election of the new At-Large member.]

Mark Tuniewicz
Folks,

Since the result of this election never seemed to be in doubt….

Let me simply be the first to say congratulations to Mr Malagon. I hope your time on the executive committee is productive and educational.

Votes happen. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. But in the end our responsibility is to dust ourselves off, shake hands, and move on to working together… openly, constructively, and with goodwill towards each other.

That’s the standard. I hope we can keep to it.

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Adrian F Malagon responded

Mr. Tuniewicz,

If emails like yours are the standard you believe we should hold ourselves to, we desperately need to raise the bar.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have three back-to-back-to-back LPCA meetings to prepare for and I’ve got me some book learnin’ to do.

P.S. Before you send your next condescending email, at least do us the favor of making sure you’re in the right thread.

Adrian F Malagon
Region 4 Rep, Libertarian National Committee
Chair, Libertarian Party of California